2012 Annual Report - Jesus College - University of Cambridge

122 OBITUARIES I Jesus College Annual Report 2012
ahead of its time. It contributed greatly to transforming a hitherto rather qualitative
treatment of the subject into a quantitative and rigorous approach. Alan was a brilliant
lecturer, able to convey quite complex phenomena in simple terms.
After the war Alan started research on the plastic properties of metals. In a series of
penetrating and elegant, now classic, studies he showed inter alia how certain crystal
defects called dislocations determined some important unique features in the ductile
behaviour of structural steels, and how their interactions controlled hardening of metals
by cold working. His contributions in this field are second to none.
Alan’s work contributed much to making the Birmingham Department famous as a
leading centre for the science of metals. Alan was given a personal Professorship in 1949
at the age of 30, and in 1955 was elected to The Royal Society at the early age of 35. In
1955 Alan was invited by Monty Finniston to join him as Deputy Head of the Metallurgy
Division at Harwell. He accepted because he expected to find problems there of national
importance which fell into his field. One of his pioneering researches there, on neutron
irradiated metals, led to a redesign of the fuel rods in Magnox Civil Nuclear Reactors.
On 10th October 1957 a reactor at Windscale caught fire and started a national
emergency. It occurred during a gentle heating to anneal the damage in the graphite
core. Unfortunately, the energy released in this process heated up the graphite so much
that it caught fire. Alan set up a new laboratory in just two weeks and he and his team
unravelled the problem and were able to give an assurance that the Magnox reactors
would be immune to this self heating effect.
In 1958 Alan accepted an invitation to become Head of Department of Metallurgy at
Cambridge. He modernised the Department by bringing in new people (Robin
Nicholson, Tony Kelly, Jim Charles, and later Graeme Davies) and new equipment, and
by teaching the subject from the atomic point of view. He also started two new research
projects, on field-ion microscopy, and on superconducting alloys. His own researches
focussed on brittle fracture of structural steel at freezing temperatures, responsible for
many tragic accidents to ships and bridges, and secondly, with Tony Kelly, on the
physics of fibrous composites. This led to the development of new materials such as
fibreglass and carbon fibre. Alan’s work on fracture identified a toughness parameter
for a metal containing a crack, which was characteristic of the material, and which,
when measured in a test piece, could be used to predict behaviour in a large structure.
This represented an important advance in understanding and in ensuring structural
integrity, and had an enormous impact in this field.
All these changes in teaching and research activities transformed the Department into
a world class institution. It has remained so ever since.
In 1964 Alan accepted an invitation to become Sir Solly Zuckerman’s Deputy in the
Ministry of Defence. Although most reluctant to leave the Department and the
University, he had become concerned with the need to invigorate British Manufacturing
Industry with Scientific Technology, and felt that Whitehall was the place to do this.
Working on Dennis Healey’s defence review, Alan led tri-services studies on the
problems, in particular the excessive cost, of a military presence in the near and far East.
This led to the cancellation of the Government’s East of Suez Policy. In 1966 he followed
Solly to the Cabinet Office as Deputy Chief Scientific Advisor. There he tackled various
problems with scientific aspect, including the brain drain, environment and pollution,
the Advanced Passenger Train and the Torrey Canyon disaster, but efforts to transfer
some government defence research funding to research in civil industry failed, because
the Treasury was interested only in reducing research funding.
In 1971 Alan was knighted and became Chief Scientific Advisor. His position became
complicated by the arrival of Victor Rothschild and his Central Policy Review staff.